I have a custom made 27mm front sway bar for my RWD Civic Wagon, but I don't have the right bushings for it. The bar was made for me by Suspension Techniques in the exact same shape as the DA/EF front bar, but thicker at 27mm (DA bar is 24mm and EF is 22).

I'm trying this to attempt to alleviate the inside rear tire unloading through the Helical LSD that's back there due to too much weight transfer.

The chassis mount bushings supplied with the bar are the generic ones with the big D brackets, and I'd like to use the OEM D brackets, as the other 2 ST bars I have use them. I may use this for site specific tuning of the car (swapping sway bars).

What I've done is purchase a set of 19mm Energy Suspension EF bushings, but now I'd like some ideas on how to bore them out. Does anyone think they'd get hard enough for just drilling them out if I put them in the freezer overnight? What other ideas do you guys have?

Thanks,

Jacques

 

just run the drill as fast as you can and feed it in a little bit at a time. spray some water on it with an old windex bottle or something to help keep it cool as you go. it shouldn't melt.

 

with a good drill on fastest setting and a sharp drill bit it should work just fine ive drilled through all sorts of plastics before and never had any problem with it as long as the drill and drill bit are strong and sharp

 

Sounds great guys. Now I just have to go drop the coin on a 27mm (1 1/16") drill bit ($$$$).

Thanks

 

You might check with an ES dealer and try and find what you need pre made. The have thousands of styles of cars to choose from and they are usually only like $10 or so. I have re purposed bushings that where made for other cars a few times.

Unless you just want to add the bit to your tool collection

 

ship the bushings to me with your transfer case. i have a drill that size.

 

Thanks for offering Aaron but I just bought one off ebay last night for $18 shipped. I figure however bad it might be (or good - Silver and Deming), it'll still be good enough for drilling polyurethane. I've also found that by slipping it into the metal chassis mount bracket, I should have no trouble holding the bushing while drilling on my small press or with my plugged in Makita drill, whichever one spins the fastest. Would some sort of oil/lubricant work as well as water, or would it be too slippery to let the drill bit cut properly?

 

it may not require any sort of cooling/lube when you drill it. after you drill it though, because the material is a little spongy, you may notice that the hole is a little undersize because it is springing back smaller after you pull the drill out. kinda like a vagina.

 

You don't want to spin it as fast as you can! You want to spin it slow if your doing it with a hand drill. The faster it spins the more heat it creates causing plastics to melt without proper cooling.

 

Agreed but you can spin it fast and use air to cool it down. Don't spray any water on there. We machine a lot of delrin/teflon at work and always use air.

 

Thanks guys. Delrin and teflon are a lot harder than the polyurethane that is commonly used in the Energy Suspension bushings. We'll see how it goes. I'm going to freeze them overnight before trying to drill, and I'll cool them with "something" while drilling.

 

Jacques, if you decide on a harder compound, I could probably machine you something on my lathe.. Also, Silver and Deming used to be a brand name, but now it is what they refer to drills over 1/2" with a reduced 1/2" shank.

 

Thanks Joe. If I have issues, I may take you up on your offer. Though the OEM bushings are "D" shaped.

 

Well the drill thing didn't work out too well. The bushings sat in the freezer for a couple days, and were good and firm when it was time to drill. It was drilling just fine, but the problem became the fact that there's not enough meat there to drill it out to 27mm. The outside of the bushing is 29.5mm, so I was trying to drill a hole from 19mm to 27mm in material that had an overall diameter of 29.5mm. That only left 1.25mm of squishy rubber (polyurethane) around the drill bit. Simply not enough for this process.

Joe, I'll be in touch.

 

always busy jaques... haha i think you are more dedicated than i am!